1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a semiconductor device, and a method for manufacturing the same.
2. Related Art
In general, a semiconductor device such as an IC is manufactured in a form of a chip cut out from a silicon wafer having a circuit pattern formed thereon. A plurality of chips are cut out from one wafer. Therefore, technical development for cutting out many chips from one sheet of semiconductor wafer has been taken in order to improve the productivity. In such a technique, there is, for example, a process of miniaturizing the chip by increasing an integration degree of a semiconductor.
On the other hand, as a method for cutting out a semiconductor device from a substrate, a method of dicing is generally used. In the dicing, discrete semiconductor chips are mechanically cut to be separated from each other, and a mechanical stress such as vibration is usually applied to the substrate (wafer). Accordingly, when the chip is miniaturized, a distance between a blade for dicing and the chip is reduced, possibly resulting a crack on the chip during the dicing.
To prevent the above trouble, for example, JP-A-2007-201182 discloses a method in which a guard ring (also called as a seal ring) is provided between a circuit pattern region and a dicing line. The above guard ring can prevent a crack from being formed and improve humidity-resistance of the semiconductor device because the guard ring is formed at the outer periphery of each chip.
However, forming of the guard ring makes the area of the semiconductor device to be increased so that advantage of the miniaturizing of the chip is sacrificed.